Thursday, June 2, 2016
Do I Need a Lawyer for a Gender Change?
Competition and Regulation in Digital Markets September 2016
20160602 - Promote Work Ethic? Government Tickets Children for Selling Lemonade
Promote Work Ethic? Government Tickets Children for Selling Lemonade
June 1, 2016
by John-Michael Seibler, CNSnews
2016-06-01
Wednesday, June 1, 2016
The 10 Worst Things Divorced People Do On Dates, According To Divorcés
Jumping back into the dating scene after divorce? Here's what not to do.
Below, HuffPost Divorce bloggers share the very worst behavior they've witnessed while dating fellow divorcés. Learn by these poor examples, people.
1. They talk endlessly about their kids and dogs.
"One guy spent the entire date showing pictures of his teenage sons and his four Saint Bernards on his phone. His khakis were covered in dog hair. Were these photos meant to convince me that he was not a sociopath but a caring father of both humans and canines? He also went to great lengths to explain the grooming needs of both sons and dogs and asked if I might like to come meet them all." -- Kerry Neville, author of Necessary Lies
2. They apologize for being divorced.
"Apologizing for (or trying to explain away) past relationship failures is one of the worst things anyone can do while dating. Men and women shouldn't be ashamed to be divorced -- it happens! -- but I heard apologies all the time." -- Shelley Wetton, blogger at Mamalode and DivorcedMoms
3. They send sexts directly after the date.
"What would you do if you got this text after one date, completely out of context: 'Can I give you kisses all over your body next time we're together?' Yep, a date sent that to me. Call me old-fashioned but courtship is fun and sexy." -- Bill Douglas, blogger at Resilience Guy
4. They can't stop talking about all they did with their ex.
"One recently divorced man started just about every sentence with 'we.' 'We used to go skiing.' 'We loved movies.' I'm just on a date with you, not you as a couple. You might need to learn to rephrase your past experiences in the first person." -- Rosemond Perdue, blogger at Round & Round Rosie
5. And yet, they spend the whole date badmouthing their ex.
"So many people spend the entire date complaining about their evil, twisted, horrible, sadistic, narcissist, sociopathic former spouse. I've done it and I've been on dates with men who literally will turn every topic around to make it about their ex. It doesn't matter if we're talking about the weather, food, a cocktail -- it will all end up going back to their awful ex-wife. Both men and women are guilty of it." -- Juliet Jeske, comedian and writer
6. They even call their ex during their date.
"I've had several experiences where my dates would spend the entire evening talking about their ex-husband and text, call and check in on their kids. I recall one instance where, after a 10 minute text conversation with her 12-year-old daughter, my date called her ex right from the table of the restaurant. She proceeded to yell at him about something he was doing with her daughter. After hanging up, she told me, 'Men have no clue how to raise daughters.' I felt compelled to remind her that I have three daughters and was doing pretty well raising them on my own." -- Matt Sweetwood, writer and speaker
7. They figure their date is a sex-obsessed cougar.
"Just because I'm divorced doesn't mean I'm ready to pounce on you. The great thing about being divorced is having options." -- Stacey Freeman, founder of Write On Track
8. They text at the rate of a teenager.
"Unless you're a transplant surgeon, why must you keep your phone on the table during a first date? I had a date where a man never looked up from his phone. After an hour, I asked him the color of my eyes and he had no idea -- and he had no idea why I was asking!" -- Marcy Miller, author of Rebooting in Beverly Hills: A Wise and Wild Path for Navigating the Dating World
9. They pry about their date's romantic history.
"After divorce, an average first date conversation might include the following line of questioning: "So, you ever been married? Oh, you're divorced. So...what happened? He die? He cheat on you? Deadbeat? Drugs? Oh, you left him?" -- Janet Bertolus, blogger at The Observer's Voice
10. They can't plan a date to save their lives.
"My biggest pet peeve is the 'I don't know, what do you want to do?' response to planning the date. If you ask someone out, you should also plan it. Honestly, just figure on a drink at a bar with a cool vibe. Women have to make so many decisions on a daily basis, whether it's about their kids, their careers or their personal lives. We'd like to see a potential partner have some ability to make a decision and execute a plan. If a guy can't plan a first date, then there most likely won't be a second date." -- Amy Johnson, blogger at HuffPost
-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.
Divorce: There's Nothing Harder to Go Through (Except Famine, War, and a Nuclear Explosion)
Having your marriage end, for whatever reason, is traumatic. You will suffer from PTSD of a sort, and for a while. You will ball up on the couch, in the shower, in your bed, in the cereal aisle and just cry, cry, cry. And that's okay. Because with every tear, you're one step closer to it being your last.
Penciling in Grief
I'm a take-charge kind of girl, and I like to have systems and plans in place. So the day after I found out how my husband had betrayed me, I set up a therapist appointment and called my gyno for an STD test. I needed to take care of me.
My therapist marveled at how on top of things I was. I guess most women ooze into her office, unable to hold things together, unable to make decisions and plans. But I was on it, baby. I had made a list of everything I needed to do, down to shopping for health insurance. I'd made a budget for living alone. I'd shopped for a new place. All this and it hadn't even been 36 hours.
My therapist warned me that when all the "doing" wound down, I'd probably collapse and need to grieve. So I put "grieve" on my to-do list, too. I wanted to do it right, and by golly, if I needed to grieve, grieve I would.
The thing is, grief can't be penciled in on your calendar: 9:30 pm: fall apart in shower after kid is asleep. It just happens. When you don't want it to. Like shopping for new decorative pillows at Target. Or trying to leave yoga class, but someone hugs you and you just. Fall. Apart. And then you'll think you're okay, and the Universe will let you know that you are decidedly not okay, and you had better come to grips with that fact right now, baby.
Letting it Happen
You won't be surprised to know that my therapist was right (that's why we pay them the big bucks, right?). Once I finished scouring ApartmentTherapy.com for tips on maximizing space and making my apartment look like a hip bachelorette pad, I kinda lost it. I'm a writer by trade, and I could write exactly ⅓ of an article before I needed to take to bed with a box of Kleenex for the rest of the day.
Try as I did, I couldn't pull myself out of wallowing and talking about my divorce with friends. They were supportive, but damn, I know they were sick of me. I'd get angry that this fugue insisted on staying over my head, as if I were Eeyore and not the happy-go-lucky girl I believed myself to be.
After reading stacks of books on finding happiness and surviving trauma, I finally got the message: I had to let grief happen to me. I had to live in it, not try to run from it. So I embraced it. I planned my days around grief ("Sorry girl, I can't have coffee at 3. That's my collapse-in-a-puddle-of-my-own-sorrow slot."). I accepted that Grief and I were going to have to be roommates for a while. The sooner I accepted that, the sooner it would move the hell out of my head.
And you know what? It got a little easier. By not trying to plan my way through my healing, by forcing myself to slow down and just be in it, I made it through what (hopefully) was the worst part.
I'm not fully healed yet. There's still a lot of crap to wade through. But I see the light. And it looks sweet.
-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.
Hawaii Law Would Track Gun Owners
20160601 - Killings in Compton have tripled this year, rattling nerves and testing a key anti-crime initiative
Killings in Compton have tripled this year, rattling nerves and testing a key anti-crime initiative
May 31, 2016
by Nicole Santa Cruz and Angel Jennings, Los Angeles Times
2016-05-31